Worcester Art Museum Commissions New Site-Specific Mural by Rachel Gloria Adams and Ryan Adams 

Worcester, MA – March 27, 2025 – The Worcester Art Museum has commissioned artists Rachel Gloria Adams and Ryan Adams to create a large-scale mural that will transform the Museum’s Salisbury Hall. Titled The More I Wonder, The More I Love, the site-specific work will use shapes and color to surround visitors with a vibrant invitation to consider the power of curiosity, empathy, and love. Starting in early April, visitors will be able to watch the artists at work on the mural, which will officially open April 12. The More I Wonder, The More I Love is curated by Samantha Cataldo, the Museum’s Curator of Contemporary Art.   

This collaborative work will blend the styles of both artists. Based in Portland, Maine, the couple has been working both together and independently since the early 2000s. Rachel is a multidisciplinary artist who works in a variety of media, including quilting, painting, design, and large-scale murals. Her work often employs colorful graphic patterns that evoke the natural world. Ryan is a painter and muralist known for his “gem” style—celebrating the geometric shapes formed by letters—which was born out of his background in traditional graffiti. Ryan breathes life into his work by employing shadows and highlights that create depth and movement. 

“Rachel and Ryan have the passion and the skills to create art that can be at once monumental and intimate, which makes them the perfect artists to transform the Museum’s Salisbury Hall,” said Samantha Cataldo, Curator of Contemporary Art. “Their mural will not only visually enliven this space, which connects several parts of the Museum, but will also define a new place for reflection and conversation. Rachel and Ryan share WAM’s belief in the power of art to inspire wonder and engender empathy, and we are thrilled to be collaborating with them to bring this experience to our visitors.”  

The core sentiment behind the Adamses’ mural at the Worcester Art Museum is inspired by the artists’ young daughters. Recalling their own experiences having each grown up as Black children in predominantly white environments, the artists shared: “The stereotypical expectations of what was expected from you as a young Black man/woman created these invisible boundaries around us that restricted us from partaking in certain activities and seeing ourselves as capable of doing anything we dreamed of. We are trying our best to show our girls a world outside of those invisible barriers, when they are free to wonder and explore all that life can offer.”   

The mural’s title, The More I Wonder, The More I Love, will feature prominently in the work and is drawn from a quote in Alice Walker’s The Color Purple (1982). Alluding to curiosity as a path to empathy, the mural’s title is an apt invitation to open-mindedness as visitors travel through the space and into the Museum’s intercultural galleries. Line drawings with iconography alluding to artwork in the Museum’s collection, to nature, and to their own family will punctuate the mural, as if embroidered on an heirloom patchwork quilt, creating a space that rewards close looking and contemplation.  

Celebrate with the artists at After Hours: Spring Season on Friday May 2, 2025 from 7:00 pm – 9:00pm. Ticket information is available at worcesterart.org/events. 

Contemporary art installations in common spaces at the Worcester Art Museum are supported by the Fletcher Foundation, Larry and Marla Curtis, the Don and Mary Melville Contemporary Art Fund, the John M. Nelson Fund, and Marlene and David Persky. 

About the Artists 

Rachel Gloria Adams has exhibited artwork at the Portland Museum of Art, Center for Maine Contemporary Art and Dowling Walsh Gallery. She has attended residencies at Speedwell and Pace House and is an Indigo Arts Alliance David C. Driskell Fellow. In addition to her studio practice, Adams has been commissioned to create murals for institutions including the Children’s Museum & Theatre of Maine, the Farnsworth Art Museum, and the University of Maine on the Orono campus.  
 
Ryan Adams has exhibited his work at the Portland Museum of Art, The Institute of Contemporary Art in Portland, and The Center for Maine Contemporary Art. Adams has also been commissioned to create murals for Nike, Patagonia, Converse, Samsung, L.L.Bean, Google, and the Newport Jazz Festival. The artists live and work in Portland, ME, where they co-own and operate a mural company.